School Life of the Marauders
by TheYearling
Summary: My first ever fan fic and it's about the days of the school life of the Marauders. As you'll noticed, I love using Sirius and James being cheeky to Lupin and also picking onto Peter. Read more to have a good laugh over it and please give me comments too.


Author's note: All character names and places are copyright by J.K. Rowling. I hope to receive comments from you. Thank you.

--

"Shut up, Wormtail! He'll hear you!" Sirius snapped at Peter as he narrowed his eyes at the small figure beside him who had been trying to adjust himself.

Peter, who have been pressed against a corner of a small tight space fill with another three students, have been trying hard not to be squashed flat by them. "I-I-I can't b-breath!"

"Quit talking or I'll squash you like a muggle pancake even more!"

"Shut up you two!" James hissed irritably as he peered through the small gap of the door, looking out at another figure with long mangled black hair and a crooked nose who was busy chatting with another Slytherin with long blond silky hair and cold grey eyes. "That git might hear us!"

"Why in the name of Merlin, do _we_ have to hide in this broom cupboard, Prongs? Can't we just hex that slimy, greasy hair ball and that nasty slick head of his?"

Lupin shook his head as he gazed at Sirius on his right. "Can't, Padfoot. Prongs' right in the beginning -that git's up to something. We need to find out what's he been up to lately –ouch! Wormtail, you're stepping onto my foot!"

"S-s-sorry, Moony"

"Yeah, Moony's right –hey! He's gone! Let's hurry before we lose track of him!" came James voice from the front as he swung the door of the broom cupboard open, making a look out and at the same time, looking for a sign of Snape.

After James had stepped out of the broom cupboard, Lupin went through next before Sirius slipped through and fell onto the ground, hard. His palms were bleeding from breaking his fall and his face looked like he was about to explode. Peter had obviously stepped onto Sirius' robes while he was trying to get out.

"WHAT THE DEVIL ARE YOU DOING, WORMTAIL?" Sirius burst out angrily through gritted teeth as he sprang up onto his feet in anger.

"Padfoot! No!-"

"Stop! Don't-"

Before James and Lupin could do anything, Sirius had leapt onto Peter; grabbed hold of the latter's neck and began to shake him violently. Peter struggled to break free of Sirius's clutches but being small and weak; he couldn't even remove a single finger off him. James hastily grabbed Sirius while Lupin tried to free Peter from being suffocated. Soon, footsteps were heard from the other end of the corridor and it was approaching them fast.

"Padfoot! Enough! –someone's coming!" Lupin alerted them as his yellowish eyes darted towards the oncoming figure not too far away from them.

"Let's make a run for it! RUN!"

All four of them darted towards the other direction, up the stairs three at a time before coming to a halt two floors up. They were breathless and none of them spoke for a while before Sirius spoke first, sweat glistening on his forehead.

"You don't suppose it's one of the teachers or the Headmaster?"

"No, definitely not –looks more like a student to me, Padfoot" Lupin replied, shaking his head as he wiped away the sweat which was stinging his eyes.

"If Wormtail _here_ hadn't tripped me, we wouldn't have to run for our lives." Sirius snapped angrily as he threw a dirty look at Peter.

Peter however, was almost in tears as he took a step back from Sirius, scared that he might strangle him again. James rolled his eyes as he stood in between the two, sighing.

"Anyway Padfoot, at least we had gotten out of trouble. I wouldn't be surprised if that slime ball git had caught us red handed and handed us in for spying on him."

"He's right, I would even bet that slick haired Malfoy kid would join in the fun and hand out galleons to expel us. He had been dying to do that for ages, asking the Headmaster for the hundredth time to get rid of us for good!"

Sirius gave a laugh that sounded like a bark. "Ha! As if he has the influence on the Headmaster to expel us –like what? Dancing in front of him, naked and humming, 'London Bridge is falling down' twice? I wouldn't say _no_ to that!"

All four of them laughed. Even Peter joined in too since Sirius had finally stopped trying to strangle him. Sirius was therefore imitating Lucius dancing around like an insane freak, making weird movements while there was pleading in his eyes. They laughed so hard that their laughter echoed off the walls. Finally they managed to control themselves.

"…That…. was… funny….." breathed James, stopping at every single word, trying to catch his breath back as Lupin had stopped laughing and was looking at his watch, frowning.

"Definitely, hey guys, its half past three and we're supposed to be down at the dungeons for Potions-"

"Ahh, who cares about Potions? I don't think that I can even breathe down there with that git in class. He stinks – never wash that awful hair of his!" Sirius said, shaking his head and frowning slightly.

"Still, we don't have a choice do we, Padfoot? We can't proceed to next year if we just ignore Potions. It's one of the main…"

"…important exams. Yeah, yeah, I know that, Moony. You've said it about a million times" Sirius cut in as he folded his arms and looked bored.

"I've remembered Moony saying that in a bathroom once-"James continued after him.

"Or twice-"

"A day-"

"A week-"

"All month." ended Sirius as he smirked and chuckled.

"We know that you're really clever with subjects such as these but why don't you just relax and have fun with us? You've missed the fun that time when Prongs and I were hiding, waiting for that slimy git to arrive and we managed to throw a few dungbombs at him from above the stairs. Even though we ran for it, we still got caught red handed by the Professor"

"Yeah, I bet that slime ball must've asked one of his nasty little spies to keep an eye on us and who must have tipped off a teacher to come and stop us." said James irritably as they all began to walk off towards the other direction and down the stairs towards the dungeons.

Lupin gave them a well-you-did-cause-the-trouble look before turning to look at Peter who was as silent as a rat ever since they had stop laughing at Sirius' dramatic imitation of Lucius. Both James and Sirius looked at each other rather guiltily as they all broke into a jog around a corner.

"Wormtail, are you alright? You seemed a bit –quiet."

"W-what? Oh, yeah. J-j-just fine." Peter said nervously as he looked somewhat panicky.

But Lupin could see that Peter was definitely not telling the truth as he laid a hand on his shoulder, stopping him in his tracks. "Come on; spill the beans, Wormtail. I know that you're not telling the truth."

Peter looked scared as he tried to back away from him, playing with his fingers as he looked at them rather than at the three of the Marauders. "I-I-I-"

"Are you going to tell _me_ that Wormtail had something to do with the earlier accident when we were spying on that blasted git?" Sirius butt in when he too had stopped to look at Peter's scared face.

"No-yes-no!-"

"Is that a _Yes_ or a _No?_" Sirius snapped as he lowered his gaze on him.

"Y-y-ye-no."

"You sure about that? You sounded like it's almost a _Yes_."

"Yes"

Sirius rolled his eyes, shaking his head. "Now your answer's a _yes_. Which one is it? You're _confusing_ me!"

"No."

"Final answer or not?"

"Yes."

"Right! Finally I don't have to sign up for a place at the Hospital Wing for any headache confusion injuries!"

James chuckled as he urged the rest to get moving towards the Dungeons. Peter bit his lower lip as he gave them a weak smile before following James from behind. Lupin and Sirius hurriedly followed as they went down the stairs to the gloomier passageways where the faint sound of the water dripping could be heard somewhere ahead of them.

"Now, which Dungeon were we supposed to attend, Moony?" James asked as they stopped in between three doors to their right and three to the left. "The venue's always changing in every lesson."

"Dungeon 3 –it was mentioned during the last lesson when Professor Slughorn was talking about Blood Replenishing Potion to the class, Prongs."

"Always the good listener, aren't you, Moony?" Sirius chuckled to himself as they turned towards their left and took the door that was more towards the statue of a bloke who had lost his eye. "…with ears that would pick up on every word."

"Oh, shut up!" Lupin said as he smiled before going in. "It's not as if the two of you would even bother to listen to what you're suppose to do for your potion brewing. I expect that you were both dueling at the back of the dungeon while everyone was listening."

--

As they entered the dimly lit dungeon, the air around them was freezing even though it was hot outside. All the Slytherins had already arrived as the Marauders made their way towards the back of the class, taking their usual seats with a clear view of Snape and Lucius up front. Professor Slughorn gazed around the class quietly; his eyes piercing down into every student's face as though he was registering them in his head. Soon, they rested upon the Marauders and his lips curled into a painful smile.

"You are late, boys. Half an hour late I suppose. Perhaps if you wouldn't mind being cooped up for a month's worth of detentions with me, then the four of you would be here for Potions on time. _Fifteen_ points each from Gryffindor."

The Slytherins burst out with laughter as Sirius and James' jaws dropped opened in astonishment. "_Fifteen_ points each?"

Lupin had to step on their foot from under the desk to stop them from unleashing their anger onto Slughorn about their house points being deduced while hissing at them to drop the subject. "_Don't!_ I heard Slughorn could go really nasty."

"Right, if he ever tries to and if that's the best he can do, I'll go barking mad and rip his head off." Sirius growled under his breath as he glared at Slughorn, willing his head to pop off.

"Fifteen points each! I can't believe it –sixty points gone. After what I did for Quidditch, it's all gone!" muttered James angrily as he clenched his fist in anger. "I wouldn't mind if you could track him down and have him for dinner, Moony. At least it'll look like an accident and teach him a lesson - and I hope he tastes slimy."

Lupin gave him a look of disgust. "I'm _not_ what you think I am, Prongs."

"Right, I knew you hated it whenever we mentioned anything about your secret inner self. I apologize for that." James chuckled as he ruffled his hair a bit to make it even more windswept.

"Trying hard to make yourself tame, Moony? Why not bite that git's head off for once –sorry." Sirius added hastily when he saw the dark look on Lupin's face.

Though Lupin felt annoyed, he accepted their apology anyway. As Slughorn was busy writing instructions at the board, some of the Gryffindors wheeled around and threw dirty looks at the Marauders for the points taken off Gryffindor. Peter looked a little ill when he spotted a jar full of unidentified substance which was floating about alive in the greenish liquid just beside him. Sirius noticed Peter's look, chuckled gleefully and pointed this out to James and Lupin, sniggering behind his hand. James sniggered uncontrollably while Lupin looked slightly disgusted as he tried to distract Peter with his books. Somehow, he looked like he was about to throw up any second and his face was now turning greenish-purple.

"Right now, you are to brew up a Deflating Draught for me by the end of this class. The instructions are up on the board. Points will be taken off if you don't do it correctly. You may start now" Slughorn's voice boomed out as he turned around to face the class.

There was a sudden rush of chopping on boards and lighting of fires from their wands as everyone busied themselves with their potions. Snape smirked, looking at the Marauders while sniggering slightly as he turned his back to continue with his cutting. James and Sirius glared, shooting daggers at Snape's back as they began to light their cauldron. Lupin was far too busy to even bother about Snape as he began throwing his cut roots into his lit cauldron.

"Snigger all he wants, that stupid git." muttered James angrily, continuously pounding his snake fangs into fine powder. "Someday, I'll get him"

Sirius agreed, taking aim at Snape's back while holding onto some puffer-fish eyes and flinging it straight at him. It hit him right at the back of his head of mangled black hair, causing him to knock his forehead onto the edge of his cauldron and dropping his knife onto the floor. He wheeled around sharply, his nose flaring as he shot a fist up into the air.

"Sir, Potter and Black are throwing puffer-fish eyes at me."

Slughorn strode up to Snape, his eyes flashing dangerously as he took a look at him before turning on James and Sirius. "Detention, Black and Potter. Eight o'clock in my office this evening and if there's any more trouble, you'll get a week full of detentions!"

Sirius cursed under his breath as James looked outraged. "But Professor –"

"_SILENCE_!"

Glaring, James went back to his potions. Snape sniggered again before turning back to his potions too and picked up his knife from the ground. Sirius looked at James bitterly while Lupin looked at them sadly, opening his mouth to speak.

"Don't tell us that we deserve it." Sirius cut in grumpily as he continued adding ingredients into his cauldron. "-as we don't."

"I _did_ warn you guys." Lupin sighed as he stirred his potion slowly.

Peter however was having some difficulty with his potion as it was thickening with every second and now, it almost looked like it was hardening as he desperately pleaded. "Guys! Help me!"

"Wormtail, what did you-?"

"I don't know, Moony! Help me!"

"I supposed Wormtail must've lowered the flames underneath his cauldron." James pointed at Peter's cauldron, indicating the flames that were now nothing more than the size of a lighted match.

"Oh-"

"What's this?" Slughorn snapped, looking down at Peter's cauldron that was filled with thick potion. "Looks to me like that's a zero, Pettigrew."

The Slytherins laughed again, louder this time as Sirius and James gritted their teeth at Slughorn, as their hands were itching to reach for their wands in their pockets. Peter looked frightened as he struggled to speak.

"Sir, I-"

"Don't argue with me, Pettigrew! You don't want to land yourself in detention too, right?"

Peter grew quiet as he increased the flames underneath his cauldron with his wand. Lupin glared at Slughorn, not concentrating on what he was doing. Once the dungeon was filled with the sounds of the potion bubbling, Slughorn strode back to the front of the class and lazily called out for attention.

"By now, you should be ready to pour your potion into a flask. Put your name on it before handing it to me."

James looked over at his cauldron and noticed that his potion was slightly greenish and too watery. Sirius's potion was far too thick and it looked more like hot white glue but Lupin had managed to get his potion right, the solution a pale bluish liquid. He took a scoopful and poured it into his empty flask, humming quietly to himself.

"Moony, how in the name of _Merlin_ did you managed to get it right? I _did_ the exact same thing as you did." began Sirius as James looked over at Lupin, wanting to hear how he had done.

"Yeah, tell us."

Lupin only chuckled as he corked up his flask. "Well, Padfoot, your timing was a little bit off while you were too busy trying to look at mine. I suppose that explains why it's so much like white glue. As for you, Prongs, you must've boiled your potion too long while copying Padfoot. Come on, guys, if you two continued to do this again, you'll fail for sure!"

"Oh, get a grip, Moony! When have they ever failed in Potions? They've always managed to get a pass for the last two terms. Can't you possibly just let them be?" Peter said, looking up at him and pouring his potion into a flask.

"Well, you are quite right, Wormtail but still-"

"Drop it, Moony and let's get going for dinner. I'm starving" Sirius cut in as he hastily poured his potion into a flask, corked it and handed it to James who, did the same for his.

"Fine" Lupin snapped as he cleared his unused ingredients with a wave of his wand as James volunteered to take his and Peter's potion filled flasks, bringing them up to Slughorn.

A few minutes later, the Marauders stepped out of the dungeons and were two floors up towards the Great Hall when the caretaker, Ogg, appeared suddenly in front of them, causing Peter to accidentically knock into him, stumbling backwards. James raised an eyebrow at him, looking coldly as Sirius glared but Lupin spoke first before anyone else could.

"What did _you_ do that for, Ogg? Trying to frighten our wits out?"

Ogg only narrowed his eyes at Lupin as Peter got back to his feet, massaging his back, wincing at the pain. "I wouldn't mind that, Remus. Not up to your old tricks again are you, boys? -Potter! Black! I'm warning you two now, are you keeping any of those Dungbombs with you in your pockets? Empty them if you _are_! NOW!"

"You can't order us around, Ogg." Sirius said, growling.

"And neither can you make us to listen to your _ickie_ order." James snapped.

"Why you little-!"

"They aren't keeping those Dungbombs in their pockets, Ogg." Lupin said coolly as he took a step forward.

"Oh and how can you prove them innocent, Remus?"

Lupin looked slightly irritated. "Because, I've been with them since this morning, unless of course you're making up _stories_ about them!"

"They didn't do anything!" squeaked Peter as he frowned at Ogg.

Ogg threw them a dirty look as he glared at each of the four faces. "Fine! Be it that way –four against one. I'll get you two red handed if I ever find out who had been playing a joke down at the Entrance Hall, making such a racket earlier!"

Ogg left them as they looked at each other, confused. It was really odd that Ogg was convinced that James and Sirius were the ones who had let Dungbombs off at the Entrance Hall earlier. But they were at Potions when the incident took place so how could James and Sirius be at two places at once? Lupin's yellowish eyes were looking at the two, frowning as he thought about this for a moment. Peter looked rather confused. Sirius and James were looking at each other with raised eyebrows.

"Why do you think Ogg suspects _us_ to be the culprits?"

"And when did we ever set Dungbombs _loose_ at the fourth floor today?" James asked, frowning.

"Then what did you both do on that slimy git yesterday?" Lupin asked, chuckling.

James opened his mouth slightly in disbelief. "We already _told_ you that we were caught red handed after we had set dungbombs loose on him. This is definitely fishy. You two saw us at Potions earlier, right?"

"Yeah-"

"With my two eyes"

"So why is it that we were here and _also_ on the fourth floor?" James asked, looking at them even while walking around a bend.

"Don't be silly, Prongs. You two can't _possibly_ be at two places at the same time. That's impossible. I suspect that Ogg was being tipped off to put the blame on you guys."

"Put _the_ blame on us? Ha! Moony, don't you find this a bit of a coincidence? Earlier on when we were hiding in that broom cupboard spying, someone seemed to know where we were and it seems very much like a tip off. It's the same with Ogg right now!"

Lupin considered this for a moment and nodded as he folded his arms, seemingly deep in thought. "Yeah, definitely fishy."


End file.
